Tag Archives: ABC

“Dancing With the Stars” pro and ballroom dance great Edyta Sliwinska is thinking of adding book authorship to her professional repertoire. She’s been managing to keep up her career — not to mention her great physical shape — while being a fully engaged mother to her and husband Alec Mazo’s 2-year-old son, Michael.

“I know I’m not a writer, but I think the way I tried to be a mom and go back and forth to work — I’d like to share these experiences with other moms out there,” says the Warsaw-born beauty.

“I feel like so many women are guilty about going back to work, and it is tough. Maternity leave is so short. Some people have to go back to work. I feel there is a way to go back to work and raise your child yourself.”

Her work has included the rigors of a five-month cross-country tour of Edyta’s and Alec’s dance show tour with infant Michael along. “That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, taking baby on a national tour. I went through a lot. I’ve competed since I was 10 years old and I’ve trained for ‘Dancing With the Stars’ and I’ve toured with ‘Dancing With the Stars,’ but touring with a baby was something else!” she says, and laughs.

One important key to making it all work for Edyta:

“My child was breast-fed till maybe like three weeks ago,” she reports. “Breast-feeding is the easiest thing that mom can do. It’s very convenient, and it’s the best way to keep your child feeling connected, feeling secure and happy.”

She realizes that might raise some eyebrows. In fact, she admits, “Honestly, I thought, ‘I’m not going to go longer than a year,’ and I was probably so judgmental of women who breast-feed for so long, before I had a baby. Now my answer is, ‘You’ve got to do whatever works for you.’ For me, with all the changes in my life, it made sense. We moved around so much. We traveled for different projects. It was that one thing consistent for my baby to make him feel happy and keep us connected.”

As far as the physical demands, Edyta finds, “Yes, breast-feeding takes a lot out of you. It does require a lot of energy. So it actually helps you stay in shape.”

By the end of her breast-feeding time, she says, “It was more for comfort than for feeding. I really, really don’t know how I did it. I was trying to quit last year and there wasn’t a good opportunity that I would be at home and we wouldn’t have something going on.”

It turned out that her and her latest “Dancing With the Stars” celebrity partner, Geraldo Rivera’s early elimination from the show this season gave her enough of a peaceful time at home with her son to make that transition.

Now, she says of that disappoinment, “Perhaps I would like to give it one more try with ‘Dancing With the Stars,’ because it wasn’t that much of a challenge for me this season.”

She’s quick to add that she loved working with Rivera. “The tough part is he is 72 years old and he doesn’t really have any experience (in dancing) so it was hard to learn anything. So that was tough. It took a lot of patience. But he’s a great person and I had a lot of fun getting to know this person who is so amazing at what he does, coming to my world, learning to do what I do best.”

Still, she didn’t get much chance to show off the choreography and dance talents that made her a favorite mainstay on the first 10 seasons of “DWTS.” Coming back after a five-year break, she is still enjoying dancing on the show as part of the group choreography, but she’d like to do more.

Then, there are her and Alec’s live shows. Edyta says they might like to take one to Europe. Of course, they might also do more instructional videos — as in her and Alec’s DVD “Dancing like the Pros” and fitness DVD “Fitness with the Pros.”

As for Michael, thanks to his early months on tour, he’s used to “hanging out with dancers and hanging out in my dressing room as I was doing my makeup and getting ready,” says Edyta. She stresses that she only hires nanny help when she’s in the midst of performing engagements. And her husband’s parents “are wonderful” about babysitting here and there.

“He actually started walking while we were on tour. I can’t say that his first steps were onstage, but that’s where he practiced a lot.” She laughs.

So, is he showing signs of following in Mom’s and Dad’s dancing footsteps?

“Unfortunately, yes!” Edyta responds cheerfully. “We both wish he would be something like a doctor or lawyer, and then his life would be more stable and secure, but he is very much into performing, and he’ll probably end up doing that.”

Louis Van Amstel relished working on a full-on samba with Tamar Braxton for last night’s (10/12) “Dancing With the Stars” switch-up week performance — but the popular pro says he welcomes getting back to the rather different challenge of dancing with his partner of this season, 68-year-old Paula Deen. He certainly has his reasons. For one thing, he and the Georgia-based foodie have struck up an off-beat friendship. That’s real chemistry the twosome have been showing, ever since their introduction, when Paula planted a surprised Louis’ head upon her ample breast.

There are other kinds of chemistry besides romantic chemistry, he points out.

He’s quick to add that Paula “has come furthest of the older group” of this year’s contestants. “There’s a change in her demeanor, from nervous to less nervous. She’s gone from screwing up big to screwing up less big.” Not surprisingly, Louis disagrees with Gary Busey’s complaints over his axing from the competition two weeks ago, when plenty of viewers anticipated Paula getting cut: “I don’t think it was unfair. He went out exactly where, in my opinion, he should have gone out.”

The other, probably most important reason Van Amstel is happy to be teamed with Paula this season is that it’s a perfect promo for his LaBlast Dance Fitness program. LaBlast Dance Fitness is seven years old now, complete with DVDs, online options and trained LaBlast leaders doing his thing all over the country.

“I really do better with someone like Paula, or Kelly Osbourne, than someone like Tamar,” he says. “My last seven years have been about teaching people to dance and convincing people who don’t think they can dance that they can — people who have to lose a lot of weight, I want to support them. When they see me dance with Tamar, they say, ‘That’s great, but I could never do that.’ When they see me dance with Paula, when they see her transformation, they say, ‘Maybe I can do that too.'”

Paula has lost more than 40 pounds. Osbourne shed 35 in her transformation.

Van Amstel is hoping to induce more women and men who wish to lose weight and get into shape with his ballroom dance-based program via his Oct. 21-starting “Dance the Pounds Away With LaBlast Fitness” DietBet.com challenge. Participants will have a chance to win money by losing weight via his LaBlast program over four weeks.

Helping people get in shape and get healthy has become much more than a side activity for Van Amstel. It’s now a mission.

The broadcast and cable networks and Internet streaming outlets have wrapped up the 17-day promote-athon known as the Television Critics Association Summer Press Tour. Many shows were touted by many creators and stars in many panels and parties — so many, it was easy to get lost in the swirl of it all. So here’s a blitz recap of 10 of this year’s top news bites.

Lee Daniels says it’s inevitable, “without question,” that his massive hit “Empire” yields a spinoff. That spinoff will be a prequel that delves into the life of everybody’s favorite flamboyant Cookie, Taraji P. Henson’s one-of-a-kind matriarch character. No word on when the new series will come along, but “Empire” returns Sept. 23.

Jimmy Fallon has signed on to keep doing “The Tonight Show” into September of 2021.

Donald Trump has definitely been fired from hosting “Celebrity Apprentice.” NBC Entertainment Chairman Bob Greenblatt told critics the show will be back in 2016 with a new host, someone who must be big and make a lot of noise.

Maybe there will be a “Downton Abbey” movie. Executive Producer Gareth Neame says there’s been talk of a film and it just might happen, though there is no script or projected start date. Putting money on this one doesn’t seem like a good idea. Nevertheless, it takes a teensy bit of the sting out of the forthcoming farewell at the end of season six (which begins airing on PBS Jan. 3).

Denise, Miss Piggy, Janice “The Muppets” (ABC/Andrea McCallin )

Kermit and Miss Piggy broke up and he’s purportedly dating a pig named Denise in the ABC marketing department. Well, we all know how celebrities gin up their feuds to create interest in their new movies and shows. Would anyone be surprised if the showbiz savvy Piggy was behind this tactic to bring attention to their new “The Muppets” coming up on ABC Sept. 22. Co-created by Bill Prady (protege of Jim Henson who went on to create shows including “The Big Bang Theory) and Bob Kushell, the new “Muppets” looks like a good prospect for another TV hit.

Louis K.C. is going to take an extended hiatus after season five of his award-winning FX show. He wants to focus on other things and there is no telling when he’ll resume.

FX Chieftain John Landgraf believes that with all the outlets scrambling to put on more and more — and more — shows, we’ve reached a point of “Simply Too Much Television,” so expect a dropoff. But Showtime President David Nevins contends “There may be too much good TV. There’s never enough great TV. We’re trying really hard to make great TV.” So there.

There’s certainly a lot of retread TV. For example, Showtime has a “Twin Peaks” revival going into production next month for a 2016 debut. In addition to “The Muppets,” there’s “Heroes: Reborn” launching Sept. 24. Come midseason, we’ll see the return of Craig T. Nelson as “Coach.” “Prison Break” will return to Fox next year. Everyone involved wants to do a “Law & Order” revival, if the timing can be worked out, according to super producer Dick Wolf. And NBC’s Greenblatt raised the frightening prospect of a new “Alf.”

Wolf also disclosed plans for crossovers between his series, including a “jumbo” four-way crossover, with a story shared by “Chicago P.D.,” “Chicago Fire,” the new “Chicago Med” and “Law & Order: SVU.” That will be in February. In time for sweeps, of course.

Britney Spears will be on the CW’s “Jane the Virgin.” “The Muppets” guests will include Imagine Dragons and Nathan Fillion. But no show is a match for “Empire” when it comes to featuring famous names. This coming season, the show’s Who’s Who includes Pitbull, Chris Rock, Alicia Keys, Al Sharpton and Lenny Kravitz.